The Caxtons — Volume 08

pages

English

Documents

2010

Écrit par
Edward Bulwer Lytton Lytton

Publié par
phiwying

Lire

Le téléchargement nécessite un accès à la bibliothèque YouScribe Tout savoir sur nos offres

pages

English

Documents

2010

Lire

Le téléchargement nécessite un accès à la bibliothèque YouScribe Tout savoir sur nos offres

Publié par

phiwying

Publié le

08 décembre 2010

Nombre de lectures

Langue

English

The Project Gutenberg EBook The Caxtons, by Bulwer-Lytton, Part 8 #22 in our series by Edward Bulwer-LyttonCopyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before downloadingor redistributing this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook.This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do notchange or edit the header without written permission.Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of thisfile. Included is important information about your specific rights and restrictions in how the file may be used. You can alsofind out about how to make a donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved.**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts****EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971*******These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers*****Title: The Caxtons, Part 8Author: Edward Bulwer-LyttonRelease Date: February 2005 [EBook #7593] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was firstposted on January 1, 2003]Edition: 10Language: English*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 8 ***This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens and David Widger PART VIII.CHAPTER I.There entered, in the front drawing-room of my father's house in Russell Street, an Elf! clad in white ...

Voir

Publié par

phiwying

Publié le

08 décembre 2010

Nombre de lectures

Langue

English

The Project Gutenberg EBook The Caxtons, byBulwer-Lytton, Part 8 #22 in our series by EdwardBulwer-LyttonsCuorpey triog chth leacwk st haer ec ocphyarniggihnt gl aawll so fvoerr ytohue r wcooruldn.t rByebefore downloading or redistributing this or anyother Project Gutenberg eBook.vTiheiws inhge atdhiesr Psrhoojeulcdt bGeu ttehne bfierrsgt tfihlien. gP lseeaesne wdho ennotremove it. Do not change or edit the headerwithout written permission.Please read the "legal small print," and otherinformation about the eBook and ProjectGutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included isimportant information about your specific rights andrestrictions in how the file may be used. You canalso find out about how to make a donation toProject Gutenberg, and how to get involved.**Welcome To The World of Free Plain VanillaElectronic Texts***C*oEmBopoutkesr sR, eSaidnacbel e1 9B7y1 *B*oth Humans and By*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousandsof Volunteers*****Title: The Caxtons, Part 8

Author: Edward Bulwer-LyttonRelease Date: February 2005 [EBook #7593] [Yes,we are more than one year ahead of schedule][This file was first posted on January 1, 2003]Edition: 10Language: English*E*B* OSTOAK RTTH OE FC TAHXET OPNRSO, JBEYC TL YGTUTTOENN, BPEARRGT 8 ***This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens andDavid Widger <widger@cecomet.net>PART VIII.

CHAPTER I.There entered, in the front drawing-room of myfather's house in Russell Street, an Elf! clad inwhite,—small, delicate, with curls of jet over hershoulders; with eyes so large and so lustrous thatthey shone through the room as no eyes merelyhuman could possibly shine. The Elf approached,and stood facing us. The sight was so unexpectedand the apparition so strange that we remained forsome moments in startled silence. At length myfather, as the bolder and wiser man of the two, andthe more fitted to deal with the eerie things ofanother world, had the audacity to step close up tothe little creature, and, bending down to examineits face, said, "What do you want, my pretty child?"Pretty child! Was it only a pretty child after all?tAhlae sf!i rist t wgolaunldc eb ec owueldll irfe aslol lvwee tmhiesmtaskeel vfeosr foanilriye isn taotpretty children."aCnod mtaek,i"n ag nmswy efraethd etrh eb yc thhiled ,l awpitphe ta offo rheiisg cn oaact,cent,"come, poor papa is so ill! I am frightened! come,and save him.""Certainly," exclaimed my father, quickly. "Where'smy hat, Sisty?Certainly, my child; we will go and save papa.""But who is papa?" asked Pisistratus,—a question

tnheavt erw oauslkde nd ewvhero hoar vwe hoact ctuhrer esdic tko pmapy afsa tohfe rp.o oHrechildren were when the children pulled him by thelappet of his coat. "Who is papa?"The child looked hard at me, and the big tearsrolled from those large, luminous eyes, but quitesilently. At this moment a full-grown figure filled upthe threshold, and emerging from the shadow,presented to us the aspect of a stout, well-favoredyoung woman. She dropped a courtesy, and thensaid, mincingly,—"Oh, miss, you ought to have waited for me, andnot alarmed the gentlefolks by running upstairs inthat way! If you please, sir, I was settling with thecabman, and he was so imperent,—them lowfellows always are, when they have only us poorwomen to deal with, sir, and—""But what is the matter?" cried I, for my father hadtaken the child in his arms soothingly, and she wasnow weeping on his breast."Why, you see, sir [another courtesy], the gentonly arrived last night at our hotel, sir,—the Lamb,close by Lunnun Bridge,—and he was taken ill, andhe's not quite in his right mind like; so we sent forthe doctor, and the doctor looked at the brass plateon the gent's carpet- bag, sir, and then he lookedinto the 'Court Guide,' and he said, 'There is a Mr.Caxton in Great Russell Street,—is he anyrelation?' and this young lady said, 'That's mypapa's brother, and we were going there.' And so,

sir, as the Boots was out, I got into a cab, andmiss would come with me, and—""Roland—Roland ill! Quick, quick, quick!" cried myfather, and with the child still in his arms he randown the stairs. I followed with his hat, which ofcourse he had forgotten. A cab, by good luck, waspassing our very door; but the chambermaid wouldnot let us enter it till she had satisfied herself that itwas not the same she had dismissed. Thispreliminary investigation completed, we enteredand drove to the Lamb.The chambermaid, who sat opposite, passed thetime in ineffectual overtures to relieve my father ofthe little girl,—who still clung nestling to his breast,—in a long epic, much broken into episodes, of thecauses which had led to her dismissal of the latecabman, who, to swell his fare, had thought properto take a "circumbendibus!"—and with occasionaltugs at her cap, and smoothings down of hergown, and apologies for being such a figure,especially when her eyes rested on my satincravat, or drooped on my shining boots.Arrived at the Lamb, the chambermaid, withconscious dignity, led us up a large staircase,which seemed interminable. As she mounted theregion above the third story, she paused to takebreath and inform us, apologetically, that the housewas full, but that if the "gent" stayed over Friday,he would be moved into No. 54, "with a look-outand a chimbly." My little cousin now slipped frommy father's arms, and, running up the stairs,

beckoned to us to follow. We did so, and were ledttho ean ,d toaokri,n agt owffh ihcehr tshheo cehsi,l ds hsteo sptpoeled ian nodn l itsitpetonee.d;We entered after her.By the light of a single candle we saw my pooruncle's face; it was flushed with fever, and theeyes had that bright, vacant stare which it is soterrible to meet. Less terrible is it to find the bodywasted, the features sharp with the great life-struggle, than to look on the face from which themind is gone,—the eyes in which there is norecognition. Such a sight is a startling shock to thatunconscious habitual materialism with which we areapt familiarly to regard those we love; for in thusmissing the mind, the heart, the affection thatsprang to ours, we are suddenly made aware thatit was the something within the form, and not theform itself, that was so dear to us. The form itselfis still, perhaps, little altered; but that lip whichsmiles no welcome, that eye which wanders overus as strangers, that ear which distinguishes nomore our voices,—the friend we sought is notthere! Even our own love is chilled back; grows akind of vague, superstitious terror. Yes, it was notthe matter, still present to us, which had conciliatedall those subtle, nameless sentiments which areclassed and fused in the word "affection;" it wasthe airy, intangible, electric something, the absenceof which now appals us.I stood speechless; my father crept on, and tookthe hand that returned no pressure. The child onlydid not seem to share our emotions, but,

clambering on the bed, laid her cheek on thebreast, and was still."Pisistratus," whispered my father at last, and Istole near, hushing my breath,—"Pisistratus, ifyour mother were here!"I nodded; the same thought had struck us both.nHoist hdinegenp ewsiss tdhoemn, amndy tahcetirvee. Iyno tuthhe, sbicotk hc fhealt mthbeeirrboth turned helplessly to miss the woman.So I stole out, descended the stairs, and stood inthe open air in a sort of stunned amaze. Then thetramp of feet, and the roll of wheels, and the greatLondon roar, revived me. That contagion ofpractical life which lulls the heart and stimulates thebrain,—what an intellectual mystery there is in itscommon atmosphere! In another moment I hadsingled out, like an inspiration, from a long file ofthose ministrants of our Trivia, the cab of thelightest shape and with the strongest horse, andwas on my way, not to my mother's, but to Dr. M—H—, Manchester Square, whom I knew as themedical adviser to the Trevanions. Fortunately,that kind and able physician was at home, and hepromised to be with the sufferer before I myselfcould join him. I then drove to Russell Street, andbroke to my mother, as cautiously as I could, theintelligence with which I was charged.When we arrived at the Lamb, we found the doctoralready writing his prescription and injunctions: theactivity of the treatment announced the clanger. I

flew for the surgeon who had been before called in.Happy those who are strange to that indescribablesilent bustle which the sick-room at times presents,—that conflict which seems almost hand to handbetween life and death,—when all the poor,unresisting, unconscious frame is given up to thewar against its terrible enemy the dark bloodflowing, flowing; the hand on the pulse, the hushedsuspense, every look on the physician's bendedbrow; then the sinapisms to the feet, and the ice tothe head; and now and then, through the lull of thelow whispers, the incoherent voice of the sufferer,—babbling, perhaps, of green fields and fairyland,while your hearts are breaking! Then, at length, thesleep,—in that sleep, perhaps, the crisis,—thebreathless watch, the slow waking, the first sanewords, the old smile again, only fainter, yourgushing tears, your low "Thank God thank God!"Picture all this! It is past; Roland has spoken, hissense has returned; my mother is leaning overhim; his child's small hands are clasped round hisneck; the surgeon, who has been there six hours,has taken up his hat, and smiles gayly as he nodsfarewell; and my father is leaning against the wall,his face covered with his hands.

CHAPTER II.All this had been so sudden that, to use the tritephrase,—for no other is so expressive,—it was likea dream. I felt an absolute, an imperious want ofsolitude, of the open air. The swell of gratitudealmost stifled me; the room did not seem largeenough for my big heart. In early youth, if we find itdifficult to control our feelings, so we find it difficultto vent them in the presence of others. On thespring side of twenty, if anything affects us, werush to lock ourselves up in our room, or get awayinto the streets or the fields; in our earlier years weare still the savages of Nature, and we do as thepoor brute does: the wounded stag leaves theherd, and if there is anything on a dog's faithfulheart, he slinks away into a corner.Accordingly, I stole out of the hotel and wanderedthrough the streets, which were quite deserted. Itwas about the first hour of dawn,—the mostcomfortless hour there is, especially in London! ButI only felt freshness in the raw air, and soothing inthe desolate stillness. The love my uncle inspiredwas very remarkable in its nature; it was not likethat quiet affection with which those advanced inlife must usually content themselves, butconnected with the more vivid interest that youthawakens. There was in him still so much of viva,city and fire, in his errors and crotchets so much ofthe self-delusion of youth, that one could scarce

fancy him other than young. Those Quixotic,exaggerated notions of honor, that romance ofsentiment which no hardship, care, grief,disappointment, could wear away (singular in aperiod when, at two and twenty, young mendeclare themselves blases!), seemed to leave himall the charm of boyhood. A season in London hadmade me more a man of the world, older in heartthan he was. Then, the sorrow that gnawed himwith such silent sternness. No, Captain Roland wasone of those men who seize hold of your thoughts,who mix themselves up with your lives. The ideathat Roland should die,—die with the load at hisheart unlightened,—was one that seemed to take aspring out of the wheels of nature, all object out ofthe aims of life,—of my life at least. For I hadmade it one of the ends of my existence to bringback the son to the father, and restore the smile,that must have been gay once, to the downwardcurve of that iron lip. But Roland was now out ofdanger; and yet, like one who has escapedshipwreck, I trembled to look back on the dangerpast: the voice of the devouring deep still boomedin my ears. While rapt in my reveries, I stoppedmechanically to hear a clock strike—four; and,looking round, I perceived that I had wanderedfrom the heart of the City, and was in one of thestreets that lead out of the Strand. Immediatelybefore me, on the doorsteps of a large shop whoseclosed shutters were as obstinate a stillness as ifthey had guarded the secrets of seventeencenturies in a street in Pompeii, reclined a formfast asleep, the arm propped on the hard stonesupporting the head, and the limbs uneasily strewn

Voir